


Change & Decay

by bananasandroses (achuislemochroi)



Series: Whofic [30]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: 3X09 (The Family of Blood), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Tenth Doctor Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-09-29
Updated: 2009-09-29
Packaged: 2018-01-24 06:24:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1594862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/achuislemochroi/pseuds/bananasandroses
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She loves him whatever he looks like.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Change & Decay

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: Beta-read by the fabulous [](http://glory-jean.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://glory-jean.livejournal.com/)**glory_jean** , this is part of an experiment to get two totally different pieces from the same source text (in this case, the last conversation between the Doctor and Joan Redfern).  The second piece is called _All Around I See_.

He had still been John Smith when she'd last seen him, so far as she'd known.  For once she'd done what had been asked of her and stayed waiting for him in the cottage until he'd returned, not wanting to witness whatever horrors he'd chosen to inflict upon the Family.  And to see him again in whatever form, Time Lord or human, was something of a relief.

She was itching to touch him again, it'd been so long, but she needed to know to which of him she was speaking to, whether it was the Doctor, the enigmatic Time Lord she's always loved, or the human man she'd learned to love these past three months who'd been able to let himself openly love her in return.

She watched the Doctor walk into the cottage in his normal brown pinstripes and the long camel greatcoat.  The waiting was almost over.  She looked out of the window, steeling herself for what was coming, and waited to speak until she'd heard him click the door closed behind him.

“Is it done?”

“It's done.”

“I'm not sure what to say.” She said it so quietly she didn't think he heard her, but she wouldn't be surprised to find herself wrong there.  She turned around and suddenly it was incredibly difficult to breathe.  How had she not thought to remember that he would look exactly the same as the man he had once been?  She closed her eyes against the rawness of the pain for a few moments and when she opened them again she could see the concern written so clearly all over him it was as if he'd spoken it aloud.  “You look the same.”  Other than a hastily-concealed sharp intake of breath, he didn't react outwardly and that gave her the courage to reach out to him a little.  “I'm sorry.  I'm so sorry, that was stupid of me; of _course_ you were going to look the same.  Here I am going on about your rudeness and me just as bad myself.”

The pity in his eyes was unbearable and she looked away.

“I ... find it difficult to look at you.”  It was almost a whimper.  “Where is he?  John Smith?”

“He's in here somewhere.”

His words were tender and his eyes, when she forced herself to meet them briefly, were soft and dark.

She loved him in whatever form he was but, so far as she could work out, this would be the first _and_ last time either of them would be vulnerable enough for her to be able to ask this and have a prayer of getting an answer.  She couldn’t look at him, but she _had_ to know.

“Like a story, hmm?  An echo, something that once was?  You told me once, back when you changed into you, that you couldn’t change back.”  She looked straight at him and their eyes locked.  “Could you change back now?  Knowing what you know about me, about us?”

The answer was instant.  Unequivocal.

“Yes.”

She looked down for a second, considering her next move.  And then she asked the question that’d been on the tip of her tongue since the conversation started.

“Will you?”


End file.
